President Donald Trump’s inner circle had to talk him down from an even more egregious rebranding of the Kennedy Center, according to his biographer.
Trump, 79, has devoted much of his presidency to remaking the storied cultural institution in his own image, hijacking its board, renaming it “The Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts” without congressional approval, and moving to shutter it for destructive “renovations.”
But the president’s egomaniacal quest may have escalated further had his advisers not intervened to curb his narcissistic impulses, author Michael Wolff shared on the Inside Trump’s Head podcast.
President Donald Trump argued that the Kennedy Center should be renamed the “Trump Center” because he was almost assassinated, according to Michael Wolff. Alex Wong/Getty Images
“His first idea was to call this the Trump Center,” Wolff told co-host Joanna Coles.
According to the author, who regularly speaks to people in the White House, Trump asked, “Why does this have to be Kennedy? That was such a long time ago.”
Trump followed up with a jaw-dropping justification for grafting his name on the institution, which was named for President John F. Kennedy two months after his 1963 assassination.
Two months after Kennedy’s assassination, former President Lyndon B. Johnson passed a measure renaming the center “The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.” Bettmann Archive/Getty Images
“I was almost assassinated. Therefore, it should be me,” said Trump, who was targeted in two assassination attempts in 2024, according to Wolff.
Despite the absurdity of his demands, the president’s delicate ego kept his inner circle from killing the idea entirely, Wolff said.
“You can’t say, ‘This is a terrible idea. This is a megalomaniacal idea. This is not good politics.’ You just cannot say any of that stuff to Trump,” Wolff told Coles. “So instead, they said, ‘Well, why don’t we call it the Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Center?’”
The renaming drew immediate backlash from artists, Democrats, and the Kennedy family. Anadolu/Celal Gunes/Anadolu via Getty Images
The author, whom Trump threatened to sue this week, added, “It’s a perfect Trump setup. He goes for the absurd, and he settles for the outlandish.”
On Dec. 18, Trump’s handpicked board voted to rename the center. The president incredulously claimed he was “surprised” by the board’s vote.
While any formal change requires congressional action, the center slapped Trump’s name on its signage one day later and updated its website to read “The Trump Kennedy Center.”
When reached for comment, Trump’s communications director Steven Cheung provided the Daily Beast with a recycled statement.
“Michael Wolff is a lying sack of s— and has been proven to be a fraud,” Cheung said. “He routinely fabricates stories originating from his sick and warped imagination, only possible because he has a severe and debilitating case of Trump Derangement Syndrome that has rotted his peanut-sized brain.”
The renaming drew immediate backlash from artists, Democrats, and the Kennedy family.
JFK’s niece, Maria Shriver, wrote on X, “Adding your name to a memorial already named in honor of a great man doesn’t make you a great man. Quite the contrary.”
While Trump may not be grasping Shriver’s thoughts on humility, JFK certainly did, according to a recently unearthed letter from his wife, Jackie Kennedy.
An October 1964 letter penned by Jackie Kennedy to the center’s chairman, Roger Stevens, detailed her apprehensions about naming the Washington, D.C. institution after her husband, who was assassinated the year before. Getty Images and JFK Library and Museum
In an October 1964 letter, penned by Jackie to the center’s then-chairman, Roger Stevens, the former first lady suggested her husband would not have wanted the center named after him. She also expressed fear that the Kennedy Center would “fall into the realm of political patronage.”
Wolff noted that for decades the center avoided becoming a “political football,” instead standing as a bipartisan cultural institution and an iconic fixture of Washington life.
None of Jackie’s fears came to pass—“until now,” he said.
Trump announced Sunday that he would close the center for roughly two years for extensive renovations, later revealing the project would cost $200 million and hinting he would gut the building’s existing marble design.
“I’m not ripping it down,” he insisted, before adding, “We’ll be using the steel, so we’re using the structure.”
Trump said he would shutter the Kennedy Center for roughly two years. Donald Trump/Truth Social The president called the center “tired, broken, and dilapidated.”
Donald Trump/Truth Social
The Daily Beast has reached out to the Kennedy Center for comment.
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